


slightly off.

by atlesianic



Category: RWBY
Genre: Arthur has a secret, M/M, Robots, and tyrian just made it a lot harder to keep
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-09-20
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:09:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26554120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlesianic/pseuds/atlesianic
Summary: cinder gave up her freedom to be with salem. hazel gave up his empathy. tyrian gave up his autonomy. but arthur?I DO NOT CONSENT TO THE REPOSTING OF MY WORKS.
Relationships: Tyrian Callows/Arthur Watts
Comments: 1
Kudos: 28





	slightly off.

**Author's Note:**

> lmao arthur has a semblance, it's called static charge and it's evolved electrical manipulation. with enough training, he's able to temporarily reanimate corpses and control them. fuck canon sdfghb

to look upon the ornate castle, surrounded by enormous dust crystals and settled in the cradle of monsters, one might think the inhabitants militant workers, every second of their days consumed by endless training and tedious planning. but with a plan that runs as deep as theirs, to assume such a thing would be wildly incorrect.

as each member of their team arrived, salem assigned them their core missions. specific ones were to come, which would send them across remnant for information and artifacts. but in the meantime, she trusted each of her lieutenants to take their training into their own hands. arthur was assigned the infiltration of the academies, tyrian to hunt the spring maiden, cinder to prepare her body for the powers of the fall maiden, and hazel to track down huntsmen.

so arthur’s days are spent at his computer, tucked away in his office, an overweight cat in his lap and music playing from the record player in the corner, typing until his fingers hurt. but when they do, salem has allowed him the luxury of leaving his desk and settling in the library for a mystery novel, or the kitchen to prepare a meal for the pseudo-family that’s formed around him. sometimes, on particularly slow days, he can even be found in his monogrammed pajamas on the top floor of the castle, stitching away at a new uniform and humming along to awful pop tunes that he’ll never admit he finds catchy.

and tyrian’s days are spent sleeping well past noon, waking with a mess of matted curls that take him hours to comb out and tie up. if his informants have no message that requires him to travel, he takes to the cracked earth beyond the walls of the castle, terrorizing the grimm under the guise of training. once he’s tired himself out with that, he’ll crawl into the rafters of the castle to nap, waitting for someone to walk beneath him to terrify them half to death.

between her intensive training with salem, cinder spends her time watching horrifically trashy television shows, a guilty pleasure she prays no one else is aware of. is it really such a crime that she wants to know what happened on the last episode of the incredibly controversial _90 day fiance: faunus edition_? in truth, a spectator might find cinder’s downtime wildly mundane and almost painfully normal, as she gasps at the twists and turns of her evening shows while she paints her nails in a silk gown. 

even with the lazy air that hangs over hazel and his day-to-day, he exists in a comfortable cycle of routine. while most of the castle’s bedrooms are rather uniform, though decorated to its inhabitants’ personal tastes, hazel’s is different. ferns hang from the ceiling in hand-woven rope baskets, mums occupy every corner, vases of flowers are scattered across every surface, and ivy plants spill off their shelves to the floor. plants don’t grow here, the soil won’t allow it, and the air is almost poisoned to slow their growth and weaken their leaves. hazel took it upon himself a few years ago to save dying plants from greenhouses and roadsides through remnant, taking meticulous care of them through the thick smoke of the joint almost always in his hand.

none of them expected mundanity when they joined salem. most of them expected that their lives would never be more than villainy, but their goddess in all her glory granted them the freedom to simply be. 

but they must all still obey.

at least twice a week, though usually more often than that, salem summons them for group training, a kind way of phrasing “no holds barred sparring.” the four of them arrive either in their uniforms or dressed down to workout gear (this evening, cinder and tyrian have both opted for something a bit more forgiving than their uniforms, while arthur and hazel have gone with their stripped down uniforms) in the arena on the ground floor, the broken moon and the candles on the perimeter illuminating the large stone room.

as with most sessions, salem has taken residence in the balcony above the arena, giving her a bird’s eye view of the fighting below. while cinder and hazel trade blows, tyrian and arthur stand at the wall, watching for weaknesses in their inevitable future opponents. hazel lands a punch at cinder’s cheek with a resounding crack and tyrian hisses, giggles. “i don’t think her aura’s gonna save her from that one!” he croons to arthur, who stays focused and hardly gives tyrian the attention he knows he’s fishing for. it’ll come, in time.

cinder roars and draws back four arrows at once, firing them en masse at hazel, whose arm takes the hits without much response from him. hazel takes his free arm and knocks it down across the arrows, snapping their ends off before he charges at cinder again. he grabs her by the waist, knocking the wind out of her with that alone, and drives her backward until she slams into the wall, shattering her aura. when that happens, all the rage drains from hazel’s face and he steps back, letting cinder fall to her hands and knees, wheezing and gasping for breath.

“excellent work, hazel.” salem calls from above, her voice echoing through the arena. “cinder, how many times must we go over this? if you let your anger blind you, all that your opponent will see is weakness.” then she nods to hazel. “you are the victor, hazel.” she congratulates. “both of you, take a moment.”

tyrian is already at attention when she calls for both cinder and hazel to sit out. arthur remains propped against the wall, arms crossed and emerald eyes trained on the previous combatants, as hazel helps cinder to her feet and almost carries her to the sidelines. 

“arthur, tyrian.” salem doesn’t need to say more than that. both of them straighten (tyrian with a giggle) and bow before making their way to the center of the arena. arthur pauses briefly to roll his shirt sleeves up, and tyrian watches him excitedly, tail twisting behind him in anticipation. salem waits, lets them settle into fighting stances (arthur stands straight and tall, arms crossed behind him, and tyrian crouches close to the ground with his tail arched up above him, ready to strike) and then waits more. silence so intense falls over the arena that cinder’s heavy breathing in the corner sounds almost like it’s directly in their ears. tyrian licks his lips.

“begin.”

tyrian goes first. he always does. he lunges for arthur, claws outstretched to sink into earthen flesh, but the doctor, without even looking bothered, sidesteps and pivots on the ball of his foot, landing himself behind tyrian in the same position he began in, untouched. the hunter rolls forward and catches the floor with his gauntlets, spinning himself around to face arthur with a snarl. “ _cheater_.” he hisses. arthur only responds with a slight twitch of his brow.

tyrian lunges again, aiming for arthur’s throat while his tail moves to wrap around the doctor’s legs. this time, arthur doesn’t step out of the way, much to tyrian’s excitement. the hunter’s tail wraps around arthur’s ankles, likely aiming to pull them out from under him, but--

tyrian’s teeth rattle when arthur’s fist connects with his jaw, and while he’s stunned he can just barely register the sound of a gunshot and the cracking sound of ice crystals growing beneath him. with the momentum from the bullet, arthur rolls forward, catching himself on his hands to flip over to tyrian’s other side again, the barrel of his pistol pointed at the back of the hunter’s head. “nineteen…” arthur whispers under his breath. 

tyrian can feel a bruise forming and then healing over on his jaw, and his tail is frozen to the stone floor by a rather impressive chunk of ice. he gives it an experimental tug, finding himself quite stuck, and growls in frustration. tyrian grits his teeth and yanks his tail free, spinning on his heel to swing his blades at arthur, who blocks both hits with his pistol. tyrian’s arms fall to deliver another blow, and arthur takes the opportunity to swing his leg up and hook it around tyrian’s neck, yanking him to the floor with an undignified choking noise. he points his gun down at tyrian and fires, but the hunter’s tail swings upward at the last second and twists around arthur’s wrist skewing the path of the gun and saving his hide by half an inch. 

the grip around arthur’s wrist tightens and he hisses in pain, dropping his gun, which tyrian kicks to the side. he pulls arthur down and cracks their skulls together, stunning the doctor and sending him reeling backward. tyrian keeps his grip on arthur’s wrist and pulls him back before he can retreat too far, this time slamming his foot into arthur’s chest. he finally lets go, and arthur tumbles backward and lands unceremoniously on his back, coughing a bit. to his credit, however, he kicks his legs up and is back on his feet rather quickly. his eyes dart to the side, locating his abandoned pistol (eighteen, he reminds himself) and then lunges for it.

tyrian cackles as he takes off, diving to block his path and swinging his gauntlets outward. he feels both blades connect, and his grin widens when he watches arthur’s aura shatter with that alone. arthur hits the floor, curled into a ball with his hands on his face as he groans in pain. salem stands on the balcony above and hazel and cinder step forward, almost as if they’re waiting to run in and do something. tyrian is confused.

and then arthur stands, slowly. he’s definitely in pain, that much is clear. and he’s bleeding. it’s thick, dark, and hits the ground with a much heavier sound than it should. and then tyrian’s expression falls. 

arthur’s face is split open in almost a perfect X-shape, indicating perfectly where tyrian hit him, but there’s no bone, no flesh. it’s not blood pouring from the injuries, it’s oil, and torn metal twists in the openings on his face. the skin itself has retreated and peeled back, grey on the inside instead of that soft clay color it should be. one of the cuts should split open his left eye, but instead, the entire thing is exposed, a sphere of reinforced glass set in a metal skull. the same cut has even exposed part of his upper jaw and every meticulously sculpted tooth set into the frame. both of his eyes are glowing, far more intensely than his faunus genetics should allow. arthur looks furious.

“bastard!” he spits, which makes tyrian flinch. “do you have any idea how long this is going to take to repair?!” he roars in frustration and wipes some of the leaking oil from his face. he sighs in defeat when he sees just how much of it has stained the front of his shirt. 

“arthur,” salem calls from above. “do you yield?”

“yes, i yield!” arthur shouts back. when he raises his voice, it distorts, like a record player winding down. then he clears his throat. “yes, milady, i yield.” 

“good. you are free to tend to your injuries.”

arthur glares at tyrian, who still stands dumbstruck in front of him, and then turns away, leaving a trail of oil behind him. hazel and cinder watch him leave, jaws hanging open and eyes wide as they get a proper look at the extent of the injuries, and then look to tyrian in confusion.

salem orders them to continue, directs more fights and watches closely to make sure no further injuries of such a high caliber are delivered. it’s another four hours before they’re all dismissed. they file into the showers, peeling out of their sweat-soaked clothing and groaning as the water beats away the aches in their muscles. but as tyrian stands underneath the hot water, turned as high as his skin can stand, all he can think about is arthur.

“you saw it, right?” apparently he isn’t the only one, as cinder’s voice pipes up from the other end of the shared shower. “what even was that? is he…?” silence. no one wants to say it. hazel glances at tyrian out of the corner of his eye.

“i’m surprised y’didn’t do worse.” he admits. “first time the doc’s taken a hit that bad, though.” 

“i didn’t _mean_ to.” tyrian hurriedly insists, pointing accusingly with his tail. “he was playing dirty!”

“his eye… you saw his eye, right?” cinder continues, pushing past tyrian’s attempt to divert blame. “and the way they were glowing…” she shudders. “why didn’t he ever tell us?”

“we all got our reasons for keepin’ secrets. he’s been here longer’n any of us.” hazel replies. he ducks his head under the stream of water, rinsing the suds from his hair. “don’t think we’re in any place to judge.”

“but how long has he been like that?” cinder asks, poking her head around hazel to address tyrian. hazel gives her a rather confused look as she hovers around his stomach, but doesn’t stop her. “if he’s really not human, he could be just as old as salem is! did he ever tell you how long he’s been with her?”

tyrian has to think, pondering hazy memories as he pokes at the bubbles on his bar of soap. “i think he told me he’d been with her for… a little less than ten years before any of us got here?” he’s not entirely sure, and his expression gives that away. cinder scoffs.

“he’s lying. has to be.” he insists. “who do you think made him? do you think he killed them?”

“cinder.” hazel grabs her shoulder and pushes her back to her own space. “let it go.”

cinder rolls her eyes and bends forward, flipping her hair over to continue washing it. “i’m just saying if the person who made him isn’t dead, we might have a problem on our hands.” she mutters, almost indignant.

arthur isn’t at dinner that night, which means hazel has to cook. they’re all able to, but routine has dictated that arthur be the one that cooks most, if not all, of the meals in the castle. the energy in the dining room feels off almost immediately without the familiar smell of arthur’s favorite spices. when hazel sits a plate of schnitzel and gravy in front of each of them, cinder can’t help but pipe up again.

“can any of you remember him eating?”

silence. tyrian has to think hard. he’s seen arthur drink tea with salem before, nibble on a cookie or two in the process. hazel can remember him taste-testing a few of the meals he made, making suggestions on how to better the flavor. cinder thinks back to the night before. he’d made curry, picked at his plate. but it was full when he cleared the table. 

“...no.” tyrian finally whispers, brow furrowed. hazel shakes his head. 

“have you ever seen him sleep?” cinder asks, looking up at the two of them. “on a mission or anything?”

“he always takes first watch.” hazel answers. “but i can’t actually remember changin’ shifts.” 

their cutlery clinks against their plates as they eat in silence. tyrian’s mind races in the meantime, thinking back to every interaction he’s had with arthur. his hands are warm when they touch, but they’ve always felt a little off. can he ever remember a time when he could feel arthur’s pulse, his heartbeat, anything? does he breathe? he remembers their first sparring session; arthur landed a hit that tyrian should have been able to take without a problem, but it shattered his nose and his aura all in one go. it didn’t make sense that someone who claimed to have so little combat training could hit that hard. 

it didn’t make sense that he could actually beat hazel in hand-to-hand, or talk back to salem without fear, or stare down the grimm without repercussion. 

_how long has he been this way?_

hazel takes their plates when they’re done eating and gets to work cleaning. cinder says a disconnected goodnight and retreats upstairs to her room, but tyrian is hesitant to make his way to the residential floor. cinder is lucky. her room is down the left hallway. tyrian’s is down the right, just past arthur’s office. he swallows the lump in his throat as he stares down the hall, the blue light of the holographic plaque on arthur’s door in his peripheral. he takes a deep breath.

the sign on arthur’s door always reads “dr. arthur watts. clinic: open.” he can customize it to say whatever he’d like, but very rarely does it differ from this particular message, letting the other people in the castle know that arthur isn’t preoccupied enough to refuse treatment. the medbay two floors up is for serious injuries, but they all tend to frequent his office-slash-clinic more often. tonight, however, the holographic sign reads “DO NOT DISTURB.”

tyrian tries the handle, though he doesn’t know why. it’s locked and he knew it would be. he huffs and looks to the door next to the clinic. he wants to stay scared, to move past both doors and tuck himself away in his room with warm blankets and bad TV that he can barely see. but for some reason he can’t stop himself.

arthur’s bedroom is open, and tyrian slips inside with ease. the room is huge, decorated much more elegantly than any of the other three, but it looks almost untouched. a thin layer of dust has settled over every surface, save for the piano and a single leather chair next to the television stand in front of arthur’s bed. the bend of the piano has a clear silhouette where arthur must sit to play, and the closed top of the baby grand has several little pawprints from arthur’s cat. as if on cue, a disgruntled meow sounds from the bed, and tyrian jumps when he realizes purrvati is quietly judging him for interrupting her naptime. he doesn’t hiss at her this time.

he’s not sure if everyone in the castle knows about this, seeing as he’s the only one with a penchant for serious injury among them so far, but arthur has a hidden door in the back of his walk-in closet that leads to the clinic. it’s an easy way to get a patient away from the prying eyes of the rest of the team, or to rest when there’s too much chatter. tyrian pushes past the suits and dresses in front of the hidden door and smiles when the doorknob turns. arthur didn’t lock it.

the doctor’s back is to the door when tyrian steps inside, ducking his head as if that will make him quieter. when arthur speaks, his voice sounds even more distorted, broken, like a bad radio. he sighs. “purrvati, darling, you can’t keep opening that door when i’m working--” he turns and freezes in place. seems he wasn’t expecting tyrian.

he looks… worse. arthur’s face is missing entirely, leaving him with a torn metal skull framed by a seam, most likely where he can remove and replace his face for repairs just like this. the skull itself is still wounded, cut open in that same X-shape, but one of them is partially closed already. judging by the soldering gun in arthur’s hand, that’s what tyrian interrupted. his teeth are exposed, appearing to be painted metal instead of bone, and his right eye (the undamaged one) betrays his emotion with a thin carbon fiber lid attached with a thin piece of metal to what must control the motion of his eyebrows. the other eye is wide, the lid removed and the brow piece split down the middle. 

“get out.” arthur growls. tyrian watches his mouth move, admittedly a bit unsettled by how strange it looks. “you’re the last person i want to see and frankly, i’m amazed you thought it appropriate to come in here in the first place.” 

“i wanted to…” tyrian’s voice dies in his throat.

“apologize? that’s a first.” arthur finished, his voice bitter. “leave.” 

“your face--”

“leave, tyrian.”

“how long have you--”

“leave!”

“why didn’t you tell--”

“LEAVE ME ALONE!” this time arthur stands, dropping the soldering gun on the table to stalk toward tyrian. “i don’t have half the time i’d need to explain this to you, and that’s assuming i’d even want to in the first place!” he hisses. “go. away.”

tyrian cowers in arthur’s shadow, staring up at a face he wasn’t meant to see, twisted in anger at him. he reaches up slowly, his hand shaking a bit, and manages to touch just the bottom of arthur’s chin (cold, smooth, with a harsh edge to it) before the doctor grabs tyrian’s wrist and pulls it away.

“what do you want?” he finally asks, narrowing his one good eye at tyrian.

“i-i wanted to apologize, really--” tyrian insists. “that was--too much. i got angry. it was too far, we’re not supposed to do that, i--” he’s stopped by a rather exasperated sigh from arthur. tyrian finally notices that he doesn’t actually expel any air when he does that. it’s just a noise.

“sit down, tyrian, you’re going to worry yourself half to death.” arthur mutters, stepping away from his unwanted guest, letting go of his wrist in the process. tyrian rubs at it, trying to feel if arthur left behind any warmth with that, and then obeys, seating himself on the edge of the cot nearest arthur’s desk.

arthur drops back into his chair with a groan, pinching the bridge of his nose. “did you really think it appropriate to go through my room to get in here?” he asks, picking up his soldering gun again.

“i wanted to check on you.” tyrian insists. “you never lock that door.”

“i have my reasons.” arthur mutters. he angles the mirror in front of him and gets back to work, carefully stitching the torn metal on his face back together. it’s a slow process, one that tyrian watches intently. every so often, arthur puts the gun down and takes a heated scalpel to the scraps, cutting away what can’t be salvaged. when he’s finally finished, there’s a perfect X-shaped pair of lines cutting across his skull, tinted a lighter shade thanks to the type of metal he used to seal it shut. 

“your eye--” tyrian starts.

“tyrian, please, the last thing i need is a backseat repairman.” arthur scolds.

arthur takes a small cloth roll and opens it in front of him. it’s filled with tiny precision tools, little screwdrivers and needle nose pliers thinner than anything tyrian’s ever seen. arthur leans too close to the mirror for tyrian to see exactly what he’s doing, but he assumes the doctor is busy replacing his eyelid. after a few more minutes of silence, arthur sits back, both eyes able to blink and emote with the help of the brow plate above. tyrian smiles.

“so… how do you… _do_ … the face?” he asks, unsure of the proper way to phrase it. arthur laughs softly, which makes tyrian’s stomach flip.

“i have a mold.” arthur explains. “the face itself is made of a special blend of silicone and synth-skin, the same thing used for more advanced prosthetics. but i always make a few different versions just in case something like this happens.”

he gestures to a small glass case on the desk, and tyrian peers over arthur’s shoulder to take a look. sure enough, it’s a perfect copy of arthur’s face, down to the hair follicles and the veins on his forehead. arthur opens the case and peels it off its base, then leans in close to the mirror again to attach it. this process takes much less time than the others, and when arthur leans back again, you’d never guess anything had happened in the first place. the cover fits in perfectly, and tyrian’s sure even if he had perfect eyesight, he still wouldn’t be able to find the seam.

“are you satisfied now?” arthur asks then. his voice is clearer now. maybe the distortion came from the missing mouth. tyrian tilts his head to the side.

“what do you mean?”

“you came to check on me, you watched the repair process. are you satisfied now?” arthur repeats.

“i… what?”

arthur groans and shakes his head. “do you need anything else from me?” he rephrases. “surely hazel fed you--”

“why didn’t you tell us?” tyrian blurts out. arthur looks surprised by the question.

“i didn’t think it was important.” he answers, shrugging a bit.

“you’re a _robot_ , arthur.” tyrian emphasizes. “what were we supposed to do if you got so hurt you couldn’t fix yourself? what if you died?” then a pause. “ _can_ you die?”

“tyrian…” arthur sighs and places a hand on tyrian’s shoulder. “it isn’t important--”

“then who made you?” he asks, echoing cinder’s question from earlier. “are they still alive? do they know you’re here? what if they come after you?”

“woah, woah, tyrian!” arthur has to interrupt him, waving his hands in front of his face and shaking his head. “no one made me, you don’t have to worry about that!”

“then what?” tyrian demands. “we deserve to know!” his brow furrows a bit. “ _i_ deserve to know.”

arthur deflates a bit. “yes, i… suppose you’re right.” he finally concedes. he sits back at his desk, crossing his legs with a sigh. “where do you want me to begin then?”

tyrian looks a bit surprised that arthur is actually going along with his demands. he resituates himself on the end of the cot, draping his tail across his lap, and thinks for a moment. “...you said no one made you. how did this happen then?”

arthur nods and turns around, picking up his scroll and fiddling with it for a moment, before projecting a photo for tyrian to see. in it, a much younger arthur stands among a small group of scientists, all of them in lab coats, posed in front of a large piece of equipment mounted to the wall behind them. they’re all smiling, but arthur is glaring at the man in the center. “when i was still working for the atlas military, i was assigned to doctor pietro polendina’s team. we were tasked with creating the first artificial human being with a soul, a way to bolster the military’s power without risking unethical treatment of our soldiers. doctor polendina and i butted heads constantly on the matter. he wanted to start small and make a child or a teenager, to test the planned functions and imprint certain behaviors into its emotional processing. i wanted to skip right to soldiers. i didn’t think it was right to make a child and then force them to be a fighter. we weren’t making mindless machines, we were trying to make something that could be just as human as anyone else. but he disagreed.”

arthur hands tyrian his scroll to further examine the picture. “after a few years of that, i was demoted to the paladin project. ironwood thought i was too high-strung to be working on such a high-detail team. my experiments failed continuously. i watched soldiers die thinking they were making a difference by volunteering. my attempts at bettering the military killed every one of them. and james--” he catches himself, clears his throat. “ _ironwood_ kept pushing me back. he didn’t trust me, no matter how many times i pointed out that he was the main reason i was unable to refine my work, that his negligence led to my failures. he couldn’t see it.” 

tyrian stares at arthur in the picture, brows knitted together in thought as he ponders the poor doctor’s expression. “eventually, he sent me home. threatened to have me court martialed if i didn’t quiet down. he gave my position to doctor polendina. and i spiralled. salem found me in the process of writing a suicide note. it was her idea to build a new body, to use the technology i’d created to give my soul a new vessel to live in. she wanted it to be perfect, an exact copy that could fool anyone. she wanted what i was trying to build in the first place, and she promised me the world for it.” he takes his scroll back. “it took a year to make. i was doing a job by myself that would normally have been attended to by five people, and on top of that, i was doing it with stolen resources and forged ID cards. when it was ready, she gave me the rest of my instructions. i had to find a way to kill myself, so i could disappear to her side.”

“what did you do?” tyrian asks. arthur pauses.

“by then, i’d been allowed back on the paladin team. i volunteered for a test run of the first successful prototype. the night before, i used the machine in that photograph to tear my soul out of my body and place it into the new one. it was the most excruciating experience of my life. when i was awake and able to move again, i used my semblance to… wake myself up. it took a lot of energy and focus, but i walked my corpse into the lab, sat it in the paladin, and blew it to bits.”

“your semblance?” tyrian repeats. “what--” arthur answers by holding his hand up, letting electricity twist around his fingers and arc between them. tyrian grins. 

“no one made me. i made myself, at her behest. she instructed me to keep it secret from everyone i could, to make sure the truth would never pass these walls.” then he narrows his eyes and pulls his hand back. “but you put a bit of a damper on that plan, didn’t you?”

tyrian’s cheeks turn red and his eyes dart away from arthur’s icy gaze. “i really didn’t mean to.” he repeats. “i was angry and i wasn’t thinking--”

“you have nothing to apologize for. i would expect no less from you on the battlefield, i deserve no special treatment.” arthur insists. “i was angry myself. seems we’ve both made mistakes this evening.” 

it’s silent for a moment, tyrian staring at the floor and toying with his tail as if waiting to be further scolded. after a while, he pipes back up. “how do you eat?” arthur laughs.

“i don’t need to. my energy comes from a generated aura and electrical charge.” he explains simply. “the same way you charge a scroll.”

“what about if you do eat? o-or drink? i’ve seen you do it before.”

“it goes through a tube to a waste receptacle that i remove and dispose of when needed.”

“do you need to sleep?”

“no, but i’m able to. i usually run off an electrical charge, but in stasis, it recharges on its own.”

“do you dream?”

that one catches arthur off guard. he blinks in surprise and then nods. “i do, but it’s much different from how i used to.”

“how so?” tyrian asks, tilting his head in the opposite direction. 

“it’s like… a movie. fragmented pieces of memory mixed with recorded visuals and sounds. they’re very vivid. sometimes very frightening. it’s… hard to describe adequately.”

tyrian nods slowly, silent again before reaching forward to take arthur’s hand. he pulls it forward, talking the doctor with it, and presses it to his cheek, closing his eyes. arthur laughs a bit. “what in the world are you doing?” he asks.

“you don’t have a pulse.” tyrian says softly, his voice almost sad. “i never noticed it before.”

“no, i--”

“do you miss it?” tyrian asks quickly. “being alive?”

arthur feels something cold settle where his stomach should be. if he had a heart, a pulse, it would race. he wonders if tyrian can even tell that he’s frightened of that sentence without it. “i… will never age.” he answers. “so long as i can repair myself or someone else can, and taught salem how to do so for this very reason, i can theoretically live forever. even without that assurance, my body won’t give out for another few centuries.” he looks at tyrian, locks emerald with gold. “i will watch you die.” he says, his voice surprisingly calm for such a statement. “win or lose, a bullet or old age, i will watch all of you die. i will live to see cinder’s successor, and her successor, and hers. if our mission is not completed in this lifetime, i will live to see salem’s next lieutenants.”

tyrian lets out a shaky breath. “but… that isn’t what i asked you.” he points out, tightening his grip on arthur’s hand. “do you miss it?”

arthur sighs. “i imagine i miss it as much as salem does.” he answers. “i miss breathing when i inhale. i miss how it feels to fall asleep, instead of simply shutting down. i miss being upset about how many grey hairs were starting to appear in my mustache.” he shrugs. “i suppose i do. but if i hadn’t chosen this, i wouldn’t have been alive for long. my legacy would exist as a tiny obituary, or a brief mention on the evening news, a spiteful suicide note left beneath the hanging body of a man the world seemed to hate.”

when arthur looks back at tyrian, his eyes are glowing, brighter than they should be. “but this?” he says, his voice low. “i leave behind a legacy soaked in blood. i died, and now i can haunt every bastard who made me do it in the first place. i get to watch ironwood’s face when he sees me again. and when we win, i’ll get to watch every last one of these cretins burn.”

tyrian is grinning from ear to ear, the light of arthur’s eyes glinting off his jagged teeth. he squeezes arthur’s hand again, almost affectionately, and then lets him go. 

“is that answer to your satisfaction?” arthur asks, a smirk on his face.

“more than you know.” tyrian purrs.

**Author's Note:**

> hit me up on tumblr!
> 
> http://atlesianic.tumblr.com


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